ZIG AND WIKKI IN SOMETHING ATE MY HOMEWORK

STORY SYNOPSIS
No kid wants to hear those dread words: “Your homework is late again.” For kids like Zig it’s a common occurrence. He and his friend, Wikki, are making a trip to grandma’s house to pick up a pet for Zig’s classroom zoo. They get a bit off track, thanks to too much gaming, and their space ship ends up near Earth.

The two land and try to find a suitable pet for Zig to take to class. On their journey they discover a lot about animals and the food chain. From fly to dragonfly to frog to raccoon, with each possible pet, a larger predator comes along and devours the smaller leading the two to discover more and more about how the world works.

REVIEW
Nadja Spiegelman scrambles a science fiction setting and plot with nonfiction details about animals and the food chain, creating an engaging piece of science literature for kids.

The single-eyed, tentacle-armed Zig and electronic encyclopedia Wikki give kids the right dose of fantastical story with real life science taken right from the national standards. Their adventure almost gets them eaten, adding in excitement, but in the end they get their fly for the classroom zoo.

It is the sci-fi/nonfiction combo that does it for me. The story is so exciting for the reader because it makes use of two significant genres to tell the story (science and sci-fi). While Zig and Wikki act like humans, Earth’s creatures are not personified; they act like animals.

Throughout the book Wikki gives Zig (and the reader) all kinds of helpful hints about animals. We learn how flies eat (yuck) and how some frogs eat their own skin (even yuckier). Illustrator Trade Loeffler used real life pictures in these descriptions setting the fiction apart from the nonfiction. The two also included fun animal facts in the back.

ZIG AND WIKKI is a hit for young kids and is my absolute favorite Toon Book to date, a choice that is hard to make when the company publishes so many outstanding comic titles for kids.

Emergent readers will need help reading ZIG AND WIKKI at first, but it won’t be long when they can read it themselves.

IN THE CLASSROOM
ZIG AND WIKKI is the perfect introduction to the food chain for early readers. I would suggest using the book as a whole class read aloud using a document camera. Other Toon Books are available electronically for free at the Professor Garfield website and it could be that ZIG AND WIKKI will eventually make it there as well.

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The Graphic Classroom is a resource for teachers and librarians to help them stock high quality, educational-worthy, graphic novels and comics in their classroom or school library. I read and review every graphic novel or comic on this blog and give it a rating as to appropriateness for the classroom.

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About The Editor

My name is Chris Wilson. My first name is Jack, which is why you see it on the posts, but I usually go by my middle name: Chris. Having worked as the Managing Editor for a weekly newspaper then as the Director of a non-profit for people with disabilities, I have gone back to school. I am now a full time graduate student in the college of education at Missouri State University. I am getting my Masters of Science in Education – Elementary Education.

I know that reading is a problem for many students today. I feel strongly that comics and graphic novels can be one way that we can combat this problem. Graphics novels should be in every public school library and classroom library. That is why I am choosing to write my thesis on using comics and graphic novels in the elementary classroom.

Email Meabikerbard@mac.com

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Some comic literature is not appropriate for every classroom, or every community. Some are not appropriate for any classroom. You need to review any piece of comic literature for yourself and determine if it is appropriate for your grade, class, curriculum, goals, school and community.